Following an agreement with the Federal Government, the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, and the Trade Union Congress, TUC, Monday, have temporarily waved its planned strike.
Labour had initially planned to embark on a strike action, with effect from Tuesday, over the fuel subsidy removal and its’ negative impact on the lives of the Nigerian masses.
In order to avert the planned action, the Federal Government in a meeting earlier held with the organized Labour, had promised a salary increment of N25,000 to low grade federal government workers for a period of six months to cushion the effect of the fuel subsidy removal.
This, however, did not go down well with the Labour unions, thus forcing the federal government in another meeting held with the organized labour to increase the promised wage award from N25,000 to N35,000 to be extended to all categories of workers.
President Bola Tinubu announced this at the 63rd Independent day anniversary speech to the nation on Sunday, prompting the organized Labour to reconvene with the intent of finding a common ground.
Earlier yesterday, the National Executive Council, NEC, of NLC and its TUC’s counterpart, had met separately to review Sunday’s meeting with the Federal Government’s offers.
According to report, at the end of the separate NEC meeting, leaders of NLC and TUC set up a committee to harmonize their resolutions to arrive at common ground. And the resolutions arrived at the meeting was communicated Monday night to the government team, according to the Vanguard report.
The Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, in a statement issued, outlined some of the resolutions reached at the Sunday meeting adding that the issues in dispute can only be resolved when workers are at work and not when they are on strike.
“Labour unions argued for higher wage awards and the Federal Government Team promised to present Labour’s request to President Bola Tinubu for further consideration.
“A sub-committee to be constituted to work out the details of the implementation of all items for consideration regarding government interventions to cushion the effect of fuel subsidy removal.
“The lingering matter of Road Transport Employees Association of Nigeria (RTEAN) and National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) in Lagos State needs to be addressed urgently and Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, who participated virtually, pledged to resolve the matter.
“NLC and TUC will consider the offers by the Federal Government with a view to suspending the planned strike to allow for further consultations on the implementation of the resolutions above”, the statement said.
Present at the meeting are: the NLC President, Joe Ajaero, his TUC counterpart, Festus Osifo, the NLC General Secretary, Emma Ugbaja, the TUC Secretary General, Nuhu Toro among others.
On the government team are the National Security Adviser, NSA, Nuhu Ribadu, the Minister of Finance, Wale Edun, Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, and the Minister of State for Labour, Nkeiruka Onyejecha.
